Hairil Anwar and Hiroto Arai secure their place in Championship Moves Open Quarter-finals
India’s Hairil Anwar and Japan’s Hiroto Arai successfully confirmed their place in the Championship Moves Open’s Quarter-finals by clinching top honours in the third and fourth heat of Round 3 (Round of 16) respectively that went down at the Jan Juc beach
in Victoria, Australia, on Saturday, January 7.
With three-foot waves and light on-shore winds prevailing at the event site, the surfers were ready to give it their all to get their hands on the coveted Quarter-finals spot.
Facing Australia’s Tim Macdonald, Soli Bailey and Wade Carmichael in the third heat, Anwar sure had his work cut out for him. However, he managed to meet the challenge head on and after getting off to a solid start with a 6.75-point wave, he sealed the deal
with 5.50 points off his second business-wave in the final minutes of the battle.
Talking to a reporter after the heat, Anwar said, “It always feels good to win a heat. But I need to make sure I surf smarter in the next one. I had the lead and took off on a small wave near the end when I should have waited for the sets, but it's all a
part of learning. When I get excited and feel good on my board I just like to catch too many waves.”
Macdonald put on a pretty impressive performance as well, but failed to get the scores required to surpass the Indian surfer on the score-board. With a heat-total of 11.40 points that included a 5.00 and 6.40-point wave, the Australian secured runner-up
place and consequently made the Quarter-final cut.
After making an extremely solid impact during the first-two rounds, Bailey failed to collect the required result in the third round. He scored 6.00 points off his first business-wave and later added another 5.20 points to his account, finishing the heat
with a two-wave total of 11.20 points. He, along with Carmichael who finished with a heat-total of 10.30 points, got eliminated from the competition.
The fourth heat saw Arai take on Tahiti’s Enrique Ariitu, Japan’s Reo Kanao and Australia’s Carl Wright.
Arai got off to a shaky start, but gained momentum in the final minutes of the heat to score a 6.25 and 3.85 off his two business-waves, consequently finishing with a heat-total of 10.10 points. The score carried him off to victory, thus adding him to the
Quarter-finals line-up.
Even though Ariitu’s surfing was not too shabby, it was pure stroke of luck that allowed him to make the Quarter-final cut. He was sitting in fourth place with a heat-total of 7.20 points close to the end of the heat. Just when it seemed that there was no
chance for him to improve his position, Kanao and Wright got called for double interference. The resulting penalty brought Ariitu to second place while pushing the Japanese and Australian to third and fourth place respectively.
Kanao finished with a heat-total of 7.00 points, whereas Wright ended the heat while sitting on a two-wave total of 6.52 points. The bottom-two finish resulted in their ejection from the competition.
The conclusion of fourth heat marked the end of Round 3, with the Championship Moves Open all set to start with the Quarter-finals on Sunday.
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